# Please Indulge my Pitting of John McCain **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 8, 2015, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545 "2015-07-08T03:02:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/41 "2015-07-09T08:53:05Z")
I have not attacked Democrats for things I actually want them to do, unlike 90% of Democrats who apparently believe Bush was right to ignore the advice of the generals. Or is civilian control of the military only a virtue when Democrats are in charge? Plus no one has really answered the question about whether or not they support intervention on the scale the Democrats have performed in the last two Dem administrations. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/42 "2015-07-09T13:42:30Z")
The question is kinda like that movie scene where Basil Rathbone makes an impromptu crucifix out of a couple of silver candlesticks and forces Christopher Lee’s Dracula back, back, back into the sunlight… Playing the liberal hypocrisy card is just that fucking _devastating_! We are undone, once again, by your cogent and incisive analysis. It is too many for us, we fold. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/43 "2015-07-09T13:56:55Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > It’s also interesting that McCain is being slammed for calling for what the generals advise in Syria, while Bush was slammed for not listening to the generals on Iraq. Makes you wonder if Democratic attacks on Republicans are really just opportunistic, not based on any real principles. You don’t see any distinction between a proposed invasion and our relatively small level involvement in Syria? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/44 "2015-07-09T14:16:53Z")
Kinda like ham and eggs, the chicken is involved, but the pig is committed. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/45 "2015-07-09T14:31:29Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > McCain wants ground troops in Syria, the generals want ground troops in Syria. You know why? Because air strikes will not defeat ISIS. And sending in a few thousand ground troops wont’, either. You don’t defeat Daesh militarily unless you kill all the Sunnis in the area. However, if ground troops are needed, let the regional powers send in ground troops. They have much more at stake in this than we do, and if they aren’t committed to getting rid of Daesh, then it ain’t gonna happen by us doing it. > [@](#): > > Now I realize you’re fairly non-interventionist, but if we are going to fight, should we fight to win or not? And once a war is started(and the ISIS fight is clearly a real war), should we accept defeat as an option? I don’t know what it means to “win” this war, so my preference is to do as little as possible. Ground troops are worse than air strikes which are worse than nothing. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/46 "2015-07-09T14:36:20Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > And sending in a few thousand ground troops wont’, either. You don’t defeat Daesh militarily unless you kill all the Sunnis in the area. However, if ground troops are needed, let the regional powers send in ground troops. They have much more at stake in this than we do, and if they aren’t committed to getting rid of Daesh, then it ain’t gonna happen by us doing it. > > I don’t know what it means to “win” this war, so my preference is to do as little as possible. Ground troops are worse than air strikes which are worse than nothing. This is pretty much exactly my view. The more we’re involved, the worse I believe things will get. Ground troops will make it worse for us and for those in the region, and might even help ISIS/Daesh. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/47 "2015-07-09T14:44:46Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Yeah, the fact that when you fight a war you can’t always control it. And if you do fight a war, you have to win it. McCain understands that. Obama does not. Clinton, who knows? > > It’s also interesting that McCain is being slammed for calling for what the generals advise in Syria, while Bush was slammed for not listening to the generals on Iraq. Makes you wonder if Democratic attacks on Republicans are really just opportunistic, not based on any real principles. **Adaher** , you are probably the last person on earth to criticize anyone for being “opportunistic.” Glass houses, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Fallen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e99b99/32.png) [@Fallen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fallen)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/48 "2015-07-09T18:00:15Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Haiti, Iraq, Libya, Bosnia, Kosovo, Syria, Yemen, just off the top of my head. What’ve you got for GWB? > > And do you support such interventions? I think you know this line of thought is silly, along with comparing “interventions” to “war[s]” that cost (conservatively) at least several trillion dollars in hard costs, untold trillions in future costs, never mind hundreds of thousands of lives and ruination of millions of others. Gimme a break. As for how wars “should be” fought, unfortunately, we’re talking about men and greed of both power/influence, dough, territory and resources. Rather obviously, political calculi “should not be” part of it. I don’t think any reasonably intelligent person would disagree. But to do away with the politics, you’d need a form of government that’s actually run by and for its citizens, and designed more carefully to force recusal when voting on matters where you and the relatives, pals, et al. have a personal monetary or relevant stake in the outcome. We’re stuck with the system we have, unless and until there’s anarchy of one kind or another, or wars are run by well-programmed, unbiased robots (Skynet!) or, say, women acquire a majority of power positions to run the global show … if ever, likely good for only a short window of time before women find themselves just as bad as the men after getting a taste of wielding real (what is absolutely corrupting) power. I suspect by the time that’s actually feasible, the human race will be at or approaching a literal all-out war of survival, so … ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/49 "2015-07-09T18:51:07Z")
> [@Fallen](#): > > … women acquire a majority of power positions to run the global show … Concur. We ought to just get out of their way. Maybe they can’t do better, but they could hardly do worse. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/50 "2015-07-09T19:54:05Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Concur. We ought to just get out of their way. Maybe they can’t do better, but they could hardly do worse. Oh, can we get rid of this idea that women could somehow be magically better than men at running things? The aforementioned Sarah Palin is a woman. Margaret Thatcher was a woman. Indira Gandhi was a woman. Mary I of England was a woman. Female politicians are no different than male politicians. Some are good, some are bad, some are middle of the road. But they’re all people, with all the attributes and qualities and faults that everyone else has. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/51 "2015-07-09T20:19:31Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > . . . I don’t know what it means to “win” this war, so my preference is to do as little as possible. Ground troops are worse than air strikes which are worse than nothing. I confess, with no pride whatever, that I can approve of the air strikes. They blunt the worst of the ISIS offensives, at relatively little cost to us. Between the wars, Britain semi-pacified much of this region using air power. It doesn’t have the meaningful nation-building consequences of occupation, but, as in a game of whack-a-mole, it forces the enemy into holes, where they do somewhat less harm than if they were not so harassed. (God damn, I hate that word. I always feel it should have two 'r’s.) ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/52 "2015-07-09T20:32:09Z")
More than that, ISIS sells itself as God’s Will. Which is emphasized by the galloping progress they have made. Anything that injures them undermines that. We don’t actually have to win, so long as they don’t. Sure, they seize armored equipment. Who is going to fix them when they break down? Mechanical devices are well known to be unaffected by faith based supplications. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/53 "2015-07-09T20:47:25Z")
And, fortunately, we aren’t killing any civilians along the way or creating more enemies than we kill. Right? Because for some strange reason, the more of these guys we kill, the more fighters they seem to recruit. Don’t kid yourself that these folks are mindless, religious fanatics and that all we have to do is bomb them to extinction. Folks over there already don’t like us, and we’re not making things any better in that department. And do you ever wonder why it’s only us who does all this bombing? I guess we’re the only smart ones, right? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/54 "2015-07-09T21:08:54Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > More than that, ISIS sells itself as God’s Will. Which is emphasized by the galloping progress they have made. Anything that injures them undermines that. You’ve posted that idea several times on this MB, and I’m not sure where you get that from. If “We’re God’s Will” is central to their message, and resonates with the masses, then the US is, by definition, trying to thwart God’s will. And what do you suppose those masses think should be done to those trying to thwart God’s will? The idea that if we just bomb them enough, their message will stop resonating sounds more like a faith-based military strategy to me. We tried that with the Japanese in WWII and it didn’t work until we dropped 2 of the big ones on them. And we bombed the shit out of them in ways that makes what we’re doing to Daesh look like a mud-ball fight. ---
**Author:** ![racepug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@racepug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racepug)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/55 "2015-07-09T21:13:53Z")
As hard as it is for me these days given the misinformation put forth by SOOO many on the “right” I actually _do_ try to be open-minded about politicians and I had a certain respect for John McCain, at least back when he was up against “Dubya” in 2000 and even going into the 2008 election season. But I’m with the OP - once he picked Sarah Palin as his running mate I lost a great deal of respect for him and some of the comments he’s made since - sheesh! On the one hand I want to respect him for having gone to Vietnam and resisted - to the best of his ability - the enemies’ attempts to wheedle information out of him. But as some of suggested he’s either suffering from some form of dementia or he’s bitter about losing the presidential election in 2008, or _something_. I still like him more than about 99% of all the _other_ high-profile people who identify with the Republican Party these days, though! ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/56 "2015-07-09T21:14:24Z")
And further… we’ve been bombing Daesh for about a year now. Can one of the pro-bombers explain what progress has been made? All I hear from the SecDef is body counts, and that reminds me of when I was a teenager watching the news about Vietnam. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/57 "2015-07-09T22:27:53Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > . . . The idea that if we just bomb them enough, their message will stop resonating sounds more like a faith-based military strategy to me. We tried that with the Japanese in WWII and it didn’t work until we dropped 2 of the big ones on them. And we bombed the shit out of them in ways that makes what we’re doing to Daesh look like a mud-ball fight. But bombing did destroy their industries, transport, and other military support. It didn’t defeat them, but it made it impossible for them to defeat us. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > And further… we’ve been bombing Daesh for about a year now. Can one of the pro-bombers explain what progress has been made? All I hear from the SecDef is body counts, and that reminds me of when I was a teenager watching the news about Vietnam. One important difference is that Vietnam was being supported by a “superpower,” and ISIS pretty much isn’t. They’re doing little more than foraging for equipment. (Of course, that makes aerial bombardment less effective. Factories are a natural target for air-power. Dug-in infantry, much less so.) ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2015, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/58 "2015-07-09T23:50:44Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > You’ve posted that idea several times on this MB, and I’m not sure where you get that from. If “We’re God’s Will” is central to their message, and resonates with the masses, then the US is, by definition, trying to thwart God’s will. And what do you suppose those masses think should be done to those trying to thwart God’s will? > > The idea that if we just bomb them enough, their message will stop resonating sounds more like a faith-based military strategy to me. We tried that with the Japanese in WWII and it didn’t work until we dropped 2 of the big ones on them. And we bombed the shit out of them in ways that makes what we’re doing to Daesh look like a mud-ball fight. My post was an opinion that, oddly enough, did not contradict, nor even actually connect, with your own. Nor am I offering a ringing defense of the bombing program. As far as grounded boots go, I am against it mostly because I don’t want to see any more pictures of flag draped coffins. But also looming large is the sense that America is so wildly unpopular in the region that potential allies are hesitant, to say the least. Further, putting our soldiers at risk of capture by savages is stupid. Our soldiers would be bait for crazy people and we cannot expect any decency. If our soldiers were mistreated by such as these, we would totally lose our shit. God alone can imagine our rage if _female_ soldiers were mistreated. I have seen America seethe with bloodlust, I never _ever_ want to see it again. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/59 "2015-07-10T00:14:15Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > My post was an opinion that, oddly enough, did not contradict, nor even actually connect, with your own. Nor am I offering a ringing defense of the bombing program. OK. I just don’t think the opinion you offered stands up to close scrutiny for the reasons offered. > [@](#): > > As far as grounded boots go, I am against it mostly because I don’t want to see any more pictures of flag draped coffins. But also looming large is the sense that America is so wildly unpopular in the region that potential allies are hesitant, to say the least. > > Further, putting our soldiers at risk of capture by savages is stupid. Our soldiers would be bait for crazy people and we cannot expect any decency. If our soldiers were mistreated by such as these, we would totally lose our shit. God alone can imagine our rage if _female_ soldiers were mistreated. I have seen America seethe with bloodlust, I never _ever_ want to see it again. Yes, indeed, there are reasons other than the normal ones to keep our young men and women out of that shit storm. But I think you exaggerate the danger of “blood lust” since Americans have already been subject to the brutalities of Daesh. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2015, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545/60 "2015-07-10T03:07:56Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I don’t know what it means to “win” this war, so my preference is to do as little as possible. Ground troops are worse than air strikes which are worse than nothing. This is a lot more of a conventional war than the anti-insurgency in Iraq. ISIS controls territory. Eject them from the territory. Local forces can handle an insurgency, or at least keep it to a level where it doesn’t concern us(Syria sure as hell knows how to destroy insurgencies). But ISIS right now is a fairly significant conventional military force. And we know how to fight those. The way things are going now, we’re going to be bombing for the next few years, and then ISIS will take over a couple of countries anyway and we’ve got Afghanistan under the Taliban all over again. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-indulge-my-pitting-of-john-mccain/724545.md?page=4)